


Permanent Injury- Pidge (Voltron) and Shiro (Voltron) and company

by AnaliseGrey



Series: Analisegrey's Birthday Whump Bingo Challenge 2018 [12]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Analisegrey's Birthday Whump Bingo Challenge 2018, Denial, Gen, Permanent Injury, Pidge Whump, Traumatic Amputation, Whump, Whump Bingo, embrace your feelings Pidge!, mention of Ryner but she's not in this fic, they will not harm you!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-12
Updated: 2018-05-12
Packaged: 2019-05-05 14:08:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14620290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnaliseGrey/pseuds/AnaliseGrey
Summary: for square #12 in my birthday whump bingo challenge!dennymark-legobutt on tumblr asked: “I only just discovered your lovely writing, and I'm definitely going to have to go through it all. For the birthday whump bingo, can I request permanent injury, featuring injured Pidge? (The world needs more Pidge whump)”





	Permanent Injury- Pidge (Voltron) and Shiro (Voltron) and company

**Author's Note:**

> I think this is my favorite piece so far that I've done for the whump bingo challenge. Coincidentally, it's also the first piece I've written that I made myself cry while writing it. Enjoy!

“Pidge, c’mon, we gotta go!”

“Hold on, I’ve almost got it.”

“Pidge, they’re closing, move it!”

“Just another tick, Lance, I can still-”

There was a soft  _ whump  _ noise, and Pidge had just long enough to wonder what it was when the console she was at exploded.

For a moment, Pidge was stunned enough nothing made sense, just a jumble of noise and light and another concussive blast that sent her sideways into a wall. It was like she was outside herself; she could objectively think ‘oh, this is probably bad’, but wasn’t connected enough to her body to really be able to tell.

“ _ Pidge _ !”

The sound of Lance’s frantic scream slammed Pidge back down into her body, and the sudden wave of pain was so overwhelming she screamed on instinct, unable to process what was actually wrong. Yeah, this was bad. This was  _ so bad _ .

“Pidge! Pidge, oh my god,  _ oh my god _ -”

“Lance, what, what happ-” Pidge started to look over to where she thought the worst of the damage was, but Lance grabbed her face and turned it back to look at him.

“No, Pid-widgeon, you don’t need to see that. Keep your eyes on me.”

“But-” Pidge’s curiosity had always gotten the best of her, and she tried again to look.

“ **_Pidge_ ** .” Pidge stopped fighting the hold Lance had on her face and looked up at him, his face ashen and far more serious than she’d ever seen. “ _ Please _ . Shiro’s on his way, we’re going to get you out and into a pod, you’ll be ok. Just...just keep your eyes on me, ok?”

Pidge nodded, though her thoughts were starting to turn sluggish; that was probably bad, too.

“Pidge, I need you to try to stay awake, ok? Pidge?  _ Pidge _ !”

She tried, but whatever the injury was, it was bad enough Lance didn’t want her looking, and she was getting so tired; really the optimal choice was to just close her eyes til Shiro arrived. It didn’t take long after that for her to pass out.

**~~~~~***~~~~~**

Pidge startled back to awareness, and after a moment recognized the view from inside a cryopod. Quiznack, what happened this time?

She was still trying to remember what had landed her in the pod when movement outside the glass caught her eye. Shiro was waiting to catch her as the door hissed opened, and she smiled at him, though his return smile was a lot more subdued.

As soon as the glass cleared he was moving forward, hands gentle on her shoulders to steady her. She felt off-balance, but that wasn’t unusual for someone coming out of a pod; his hand, reaching up to gently hold her chin  _ was  _ kind of odd, though. It also felt vaguely familiar.

“What do you remember about getting hurt, Katie?”

Oh.  _ That  _ didn’t bode well.

“Uh- I was at the control console, and there was some sort of noise, and then everything- everything blew up?”

Shiro nodded. “That’s right. What else do you remember?” 

Pidge concentrated, trying to recall what had happened next. Something with Lance…

“Lance- Lance helped me, he wouldn’t let me see…” Pidge trailed off, realizing for the first time that nobody else was in the pod room; usually everyone gathered around to greet the person coming out of the pod, but the only person here was Shiro. A cold feeling started to settle in the pit of her stomach, and Pidge swallowed past the sudden lump in her throat, her voice coming out more like a strained whisper than she’d intended.

“How- how bad is it?”

Shiro’s expression was momentarily pained, but he controlled his expression quickly enough Pidge almost didn’t notice.

“You lost part of your arm.”

Pidge stilled for a moment.

“What?”

Shiro winced, sympathetic, then repeated himself. “You lost part of your left arm.”

Pidge blinked. Huh. “That’s what I thought you said.”

Shiro frowned. “Are you ok?”

“Well. I mean, I’m missing part of my arm, but yeah, I think I’m ok. Can I see it?”

It was Shiro’s turn to look stunned. “What?”

Pidge huffed. “Can I see it? I mean, I’m going to have to at some point, might as well be now.”

Shiro gave her a considering look then nodded, letting go of his hold on her chin. He reached down and rolled up the sleeve of the cryo suit for her and nodded again when he was done. She took a steadying breath, then looked.

Her left arm now ended just below the bend of her elbow, the scar tissue smooth and shiny as if it had been this way for years instead of what was probably just a few quintents. Coran and Allura had explained that while the cryopods could do a lot to heal a person, they couldn’t regrow something that was missing.

“Ok.”

“Ok?”

Pidge nodded. “Ok.”

Shiro gave her an incredulous look. “ _ Really _ ?”

Pidge shrugged, and wow, that felt weird.

“I mean, it’s still my arm, right? Just...less of it.”

Shiro didn’t look like he entirely believed her, but she wasn’t lying. For now, she was ok.

She continued to be ok through the awkward and teary-eyed reunion with the other paladins; she learned she’d been in the pod for almost a full cycle, to heal her arm, as well as the burns and the injuries she’d taken from shrapnel when the console blew. Hunk kept plying her with food, and Lance kept looking at her as if she’d die if he moved more than 5 feet away from her. Keith was slightly quieter than normal, but did give her a quick hug when nobody was looking. She managed alright at dinner, Hunk having thoughtfully made something she wouldn’t need to cut up. Over dinner, Coran and Allura informed her than once she’d had a few more days to adjust, they could start working on a prosthetic, if she wanted. They’d already put a call in to Olkarion, and Ryner was available to chat whenever she was ready.

Everything was fine.

Really.

The next few days seemed to skip by, between the physical therapy exercises Coran had developed to strengthen what was left of her arm, and working with Hunk to design the prosthetic, Pidge was doing great. She’d stopped down to see her lion, and Green had flooded her mind with warmth, welcoming her back, and offering support, which of course Pidge appreciated. Through it all, Shiro was a quiet shadow, never getting in her way, not being overbearing or intrusive, but just...there.

Around.

Available.

But she was fine. She didn’t need help.

She was completely, totally, and unabashedly fine.

Until she wasn’t.

It was late, and she had stayed in the workshop to keep poking at the designs for her arm; she was idly trying to figure out whether Olkari technology would let her arm transform the way that she was able to get other Olkari tech to transform, or if she’d need one of the headsets to make it work. The idea of an arm that could transform into a blaster cannon on a whim was kind of fun, but she wasn’t sure how practical it was if she’d need to wear a special headband to make it work.

She was scribbling notes with her right hand, and absently reached with her left for her cup to grab a drink, but instead of grabbing, nothing happened. It took her a moment, and all at once, she realized what she’d done. She couldn’t grab her cup with her left hand, because that hand didn’t exist anymore. It was gone, forever, and while she could replace it, and the new arm they were designing would be awesome, it wouldn’t be the once she was born with, it wasn’t  _ hers _ .

She hadn’t even realized she’d started crying until a sob tore loose, and god _ damnit _ , this was  _ stupid _ , there was no reason to be crying. Lots of people lost limbs every day, sometimes even  _ more  _ than one. Hell, Shiro had lost his, and he was more or less ok. It wasn’t the end of the world. She’d get by just fine. She was  _ fine _ , she was-

Pidge screamed, swiping things off her desk. She’d regret it later, but right now she just needed to destroy something. There was a feeling in her chest, some roiling combination of rage and frustration and loss that bubbled up like lava from a volcano, unstoppable and violent. She grabbed a wrench and flung it across the room, but it wasn’t enough. She turned and grabbed for the cup next, throwing it at the floor, and was furious when it didn’t break. God damn  _ fucking  _ Altean cup, she wanted it to break, to  _ smash _ , into tiny  _ fucking  _ pieces, and it wouldn’t...it  _ wouldn’t _ …

Pidge sank down onto her knees sobbing, folding over in half so she was resting on her right arm and part of her stump, her forehead almost on the floor.

“Aww, Pidge.”

There were quiet steps, then the sound of Shiro kneeling down next to her, moving some of the scattered debris from her tantrum out of the way. He put a gentle hand on her back, and she curled in to lean against him as he wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close to his chest and murmuring nonsense to her.

She didn’t know how long they sat there for, but by the time her sobs had wound down to stuttering gasps and sniffles, she felt utterly drained. Shiro was still rubbing soothing circles on her back with one hand and holding her close with the other, humming something she didn’t recognize.

It took another few hiccupping breaths before she was able to speak again, her voice rough. “Sorry.”

“There’s nothing to be sorry about.”

“I cried all over you. It’s gross.”

Shiro shrugged. “Not the worst that's ever happened to me.”

“It’s a stupid thing to cry about.”

“Why?”

“It’s- it’s not the end of the world. Lots of people lose limbs. I didn’t even lose the whole  _ thing _ . Just part of it. I’m designing the replacement, and it’s gonna be fantastic, and it’s just-” Pidge took a shuddering breath, frustrated with how she felt on the verge of tears again. “It just seems a ridiculous thing to get upset over.”

Shiro was quiet a moment, his hand stilling on her back.

“Are you seriously trying to logic your way out of feeling bad about getting your arm blown off?”

Pidge gave a watery laugh. “Well, when you put it that way, it sounds stupid.”

Shiro snorted indelicately above her, and pulled her into a tighter hug before loosening his arms, letting her lean up against his chest again. “You’re generally a very practical and pragmatic person, Pidge. You deal with tech a lot, and while that has a lot of room for creativity, it’s usually pretty absolute. It’s rational, binary. Things either are, or aren’t.”

“Unless it’s quantum mechanics, then it could possibly be-”

Shiro smiled. “Let me finish before you go all tech geek on me.”

Pidge nodded, quieting down, and Shiro went on.

“Like I was saying, you’re used to dealing with absolutes. Logical, rational actions and reactions. For the most part, with tech, if you do ‘a’ plus ‘b’, you get result ‘c’. Right now, your emotions are running closer to the surface than you’re used to, and emotions aren’t always rational. You’re grieving, Pidge. You’re grieving a monumental loss, and crying is a perfectly normal type of response to have. It’s going to take time, and parts of it will be ugly, and irrational, and yeah, kind of ridiculous, but it’ll happen. There’ll come a day when it doesn’t hurt so bad, and until then, you’ve got all of us to lean on if you need us.” 

Pidge sniffled, reaching up to scrub fresh tears off her face.

“Damnit, Shiro, you’re gonna make me start crying again.”

“Well, we can’t have  _ that _ , can we. C’mon.” Shiro pulled back and rolled up to his feet, holding his hand down to pull Pidge up. She wobbled, and Shiro put a steadying hand on her shoulder.

“It’s late, but I think we should get some food and water into you before you go to sleep. You’ll feel better for it.”

Shiro turned around so his back was to Pidge and knelt down.

“What are you doing?”

“Trying to give you a piggyback ride, obviously.”

Pidge’s eyes widened. “ _ Really _ ?”

Shiro smiled back at her over his shoulder. “Really. But if you breathe a  _ word  _ of this to Lance, it will never happen again, got it?”

Pidge nodded frantically and hooked both arms around Shiro’s neck, hoping she’d have a good enough grip so she wouldn’t fall off. Shiro stood in a fluid motion, eliciting a yelp from her until he reached back and grabbed her legs, hefting up and supporting some of her weight.

“Let’s go. I think there are some of the cookies from earlier left, and I know where Hunk hides the space cocoa.”

They’d gotten about halfway to the kitchen when Pidge smooshed her face into the back of Shiro’s neck and whispered, “ _ Thanks. _ ”

Shiro gently squeezed at his hold on her legs. “Anytime.”


End file.
